The Ladder
by ForeverinMoonlight
Summary: -AU. Based on Wei DW7 DLC outfits-  It was so easy to fall.


_Disclaimer: I cannot truthfully say that I own Dynasty Warriors, I'm afraid._

**A/N:** This is a Jia Xu fic which takes inspiration from the DW7 Wei DLC outfits that you can buy. Janitor!Jia Xu kind of amuses me. xD ..Anyway. Read on, and I hope you enjoy..!

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><p><strong>The Ladder<strong>

Sigh.

_Oh, how the mighty have fallen.._

He had found that saying to be particularly apt in recent times, in more ways than one. ..Indeed, if his current schedule wasn't so.. brimming with enterprise (hah) right now he could even make you a list.

It would be lengthy. Extensive. Depending on your brainpo- er, _viewpoint_, it would likely also be predictable to the point of triviality.

But that did not matter. Jia Xu could give you the 'highlights' of such a (thankfully non-existent) list, if you so desired. In truth, he himself had little inclination to do so, but since they came so easily to mind they would not be at all difficult to share.

Sometimes events and personalities in your own life were.. almost _too _memorable, were they not? Though not always exactly pleasant, they were so vivid they became a stain on your consciousness anyway. ..Ooh, a 'stain on one's consciousness'.. An almost stylish turn of phrase, but far more than this first person deserved.

Jia Xu only called Dong Zhuo a person in the same sense that you tend to label something water-dwelling (that has fins, a tail, gills and a vacant expression) as a 'fish'. You could technically call the 'man' a human – he _had_ to be, surely? But.. it was questionable. ..Anyway. Dong Zhuo had been a great bulbous thing, and most definitely not pleasant.. Though there was one fact that was undeniable.

Dong Zhuo had been powerful. _Extremely_ powerful, having made his way up with grubby mitts all the way to the top (or as good as top) of the corporate ladder. He swam in (no, more likely _floated on_) money and booze and debauchery – you know, the usual stuff. Think a stereotypical power-hungry monster, and you just about have the idea.

Cue a typical reign of dodgy dealings and tyranny. The man had fingers in most possible shades of pie (but often the dark kinds), and of course if you opposed him you were dead (or 'disappeared mysteriously').

..But let us not dwell over such a 'person' for much longer. Jia Xu certainly did not want to – working for him had been bad enough..- _Oh yes_, don't look so surprised (or even unsurprised.. somewhere in between will do nicely). The vast majority of anywhere worth talking about was owned by Dong Zhuo, so naturally, most people had been forced to work for him at one time or another.

He had been massive. Not merely in size but in influence – as previously mentioned he owned basically everything.. including the law. His meaty fists held the police in a vice-like grip, thanks largely (heh) to his neph..- son-in..- no, son? What had it been? Ah, whatever. _Thanks to Lu Bu_.

_Lu Bu_. The most feared police officer around – just as dangerous and even more real than his.. well, than Dong Zhuo anyway. Lu Bu was what mothers threatened their unruly children with – which was really unfair, considering even hardened criminals broke out into a sweat (and tremors and even tears) at the mere mention of the officer's name. Lu Bu was terror, Lu Bu meant control, and ironically enough also meant death to the 'Great' Dong Zhuo.

..Hence Jia Xu's first notable use of the saying. Though really, it had been inevitable that he would be toppled – you need only apply logic (or read a history book) to work that out.

Dong Zhuo was killed, and yet more anarchy reigned – this time Lu Bu-like in flavour. It has already been stated that Lu Bu was a dangerous man, and perhaps Jia Xu should have added that the former officer wasn't exactly a pleasant man to deal with either. He was _nasty_, this time in a RRRARGH I WILL CRUSH ALL YOUR BONES AND EVERYTHING ELSE WITHIN RANGE TOO! sort of way. Angry and powerful and certain death if you were to face him in a fight – again, you know the type.

He was just _begging _to be taken down a peg or two of course, and that finally happened in the form of.. well, a coalition and some brainstorming. If you face someone who is all brawn then you defeat them with intelligence – _naturally_, he could have told you that – but yes. Another mighty 'being' had fallen.

There was a new power now (and oh, that was such a cheesy sentence). One among many, but this one had started to stand out. _Cao Cao_ was the name most people were talking about these days.. _Cao Cao_, the rising company star. A dark star; a shady star, going by the rumours. To be honest, Jia Xu could believe what he heard about the doubtable methods and the ruthless _modus operandi_.

After all, he had witnessed it first hand.. After a fashion.

Unlike those previously discussed, he had not had the 'pleasure' of meeting the 'Hero of Chaos' (what a brand name..) until very very recently. Before this honour he had been working for the company headed by the relatively small-time Zhang Xiu. It had been in a fairly influential capacity however so he had not minded, and indeed, his rather.. mild boss was almost a nice change of pace.

The company had not been that big, but Jia Xu knew that Cao Cao would be paying attention to them sooner or later. With ambition like his, after all, it was obvious that the man wanted everything under his control, or to die trying to obtain it. _Very dangerous indeed.._

However, even Jia Xu had to admit he hadn't thought that the Wei director would make a move on their small-ish company quite _that _soon.

..Was it his fault?

No.. It couldn't be that simple. It _never was_ that simple, even if Cao Cao believed it to be so. But what Jia Xu was fairly certain of was that after what happened to _that man_.. everything had very quickly changed.

Or perhaps 'sped up'. Zhang Xiu may not have liked Cao Cao after how he had supposedly slighted his beloved uncle, but.. Even before that match, Cao Cao's momentum had been gaining in power. He had been climbing the ranks, securing the right deals, etc. etc. It was only a matter of time..

Nevertheless. The cloud of rumours hung over them both. The two company owners didn't even need to meet for relations between them to continue to sour. And one day word of an assassination contract reached Zhang Xiu's soon alarmed ears – he was to be the victim, he was going to die, oh Gods what do I do Jia Xu help me you _cannot_ just let me be _killed_-!

He panicked so easily... But then Jia Xu supposed he could understand. An assassination order even_ possibly_ ordered by Cao Cao himself, even_ possibly_ only rumour was still not to be taken lightly.

But what could he do?

Well..

He did his job. At the end of the day, that was all he was there to do. A pre-emptive strike had been necessary, and so he had seen it done.

It had been meant to be a warning.

A warning.

_Heh_. Well, inadvertently or not, it had turned out to be quite the strong one.

An 'accident' at the arena leaving two dead and one as good as. Their names? Well, the first two were more notable by their status – Cao Cao's very own first born son, and the second his nephew.

(No need to wince – Jia Xu _knew_. 'Ouch'.)

The third person was _that man_ – Dian Wei, they called him, a formidable wrestler who also happened to be one of Cao Cao's most trusted bodyguards. He was the intended victim of the warning.

However, it had never been intended to make him the victim of such an 'accident'. The single quotation marks around 'accident' there are only in place because everyone strongly suspects they are.. In actual fact, it had been genuine and absolute.. well.. happenstance.

_Hah._ Though he had not a chance in any realm of Hell of convincing Cao Cao of that... And regardless, it's not like that even mattered.

It had happened. Unfortunately.

They were dead. _Unfortunately_.

Dian Wei was hooked up to life support, his _bleep_ brain _bleep_ currently _bleep _not _bleep_ much _bleep_ more_ bleep_ than _bleep_ mush.

Most.. unfortunate.

He was not going to apologise. What was the point? It was done, the warning (whatever good it was now..) had been delivered, and to be entirely truthful to you.. Well...

_He had only done his job_. Was that not the case? Whatever way he had gone about it (however tragically it had turned out), Jia Xu had done what was required of him. Besides.. It was not as if Cao Cao could damn him for questionable methods (..without at least being hypocritical, anyway).

_Sigh_. None of that mattered any more. The mighty Dian Wei had fallen and two of Cao Cao's relatives were buried, and though the Wei director may understand why it happened.. Jia Xu had doubted that it would quench any thirst for revenge.

Lu Bu had ended up being little more than a nuisance to Cao Cao – and what had happened to him..

(_Shudder_.)

Jia Xu, on the other hand, may have normally been considered even less than a nuisance to Cao Cao beside the once formidable officer.. Yet he had now been implicated in the deaths of close relatives and the incapacitation of Dian Wei.

Never mind the family members, _rumour would have it_ that Cao Cao was rather.. fond of his bodyguards.

Oh dear...

You could just imagine how much he had been sweating when he had been 'kindly escorted' for a meeting with the 'Hero of Chaos' himself. (This was after the value of Zhang Xiu's company had swiftly plummeted, and it had been bought out by Wei, of course. Outside the mild irritation redundancy had brought to him Jia Xu had felt slightly impressed – it had been almost as well-executed as he himself would have handled it. ..But this was digression.) He had never particularly feared for his own life before, and still had not then – no, Cao Cao was far more classy than that.. So the dread that had roiled in the pit of his stomach was at what unique form of torture and/or humiliation he would be deemed to suffer.

(Then again, the possibility that he could be taken out to the middle of nowhere and shot wasn't exactly wonderful to think about either.)

…

..What had happened?

_Hahaha._ Well..

He was still not entirely sure why he had ended up here, but what it had convinced him of was that Cao Cao had a bizarre, and slightly twisted sense of humour.

_Oh, how the mighty have fallen.._

That saying again – and now, as irony would have it, he was applying it towards himself.

This hadn't been the sort of 'torture' he was expecting, though it was a little embarrassing being required to complete such menial work.

_Rather a waste, as well._

Jia Xu placed the bucket on the cold, tiled floor, sparing a glance at the murky water sloshing about in the well-used container. _Oh well.. It's not as if it's going to last._

Yes, this would only be temporary. Pardon the lack of modesty, but he was too good to remain in such a monotonous post for long. With his ability, he'd be climbing back up in no time...

Cao Cao made use of talent – it was currently only a matter of how much longer the head of Wei would stay so 'unhappy' with him.

But yes. He had better get on with it, lest Xiahou Dun yell at him again. Hah, not that he needed to – every word of what Cao Cao had said to him that day was still ingrained into his mind, and parts echoed inside his head even now.

"_Remember, Jia Xu," Cao Cao met his eyes, granite mixed with arrogance (and if he dared imagine it, cold anger behind the stone). "My school is the very _best_. It should be nothing but _spotless_, don't you agree?"_

To mock and be entirely cool and deadpan at the same time.. Yes, that guy had skill.

..He did not need to worry.

Jia Xu always did the job that was required of him. He picked up the mop, dunked it into the water with a snort. _Well, at least I'm being employed._

How did that other saying go again..? Ah, yes.

'_It could be worse_'.


End file.
